


white noise

by merriell



Category: Falsettos - Lapine/Finn, The Book of Mormon - Parker/Stone/Lopez
Genre: F/F, F/M, Fantasy mystery, Kevin and Whizzer are twins, M/M, Magical Realism, Modern AU, future cordelia/charlotte, ghost au, marvin/trina is divorced already, more tags will be added eventually, things are not as normal as they seem, this is a modern au with fantasy in it
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-04-25
Updated: 2018-05-12
Packaged: 2019-04-27 18:29:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,917
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14431575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merriell/pseuds/merriell
Summary: When Kevin Price’s recently-deceased ghost shows up in his room at the middle of the night, Marvin is completely sure he’d gone temporarily insane during his sleep.Kevin believes that his twin brother need to know that he's dead for him to pass on peacefully. Marvin refuses.The world isn't going to let that one slide easily.





	1. The Ghost of Your Employee

He’s awoken to see Price peering over him, his white suit proper like it’s been freshly-pressed. Marvin, justifiably freaking out, knocks over the glass of water near his bed, blood rushing away from his face as rushed as he was rushed away from the dream world.

“You’re dead,” says Marvin, and thinks, this is one of the stupidest thing he’d ever said in his life.

“I know,” Kevin answers, and it’s almost like Marvin isn’t the one who found his body lying on his room two weeks ago, body rotting like he’d died for more than a week although Marvin saw him the night before, laughing as he was reading an e-mail from his best friend that had went to Africa a few weeks ago. “I also thought that I’m dead.”

“I must be crazy.”

“And I must be in hell,” Kevin says. “I really thought I was going to heaven, but I guess blaming my brother for eating that donut really damned me.”

Marvin looks at the digital clock at his bedside—3:02 AM—then to the shards of glasses mingling with puddle of water on the floor. He decides it’s a dream. He lays back down on his very comfortable bed, closes his eyes and lets the blanket lull him to sleep.

 

The sunrise peeks from his half-opened windows, slowly rousing Marvin from sleep. He sits up groggily, feeling sleep still hugging his neck, tying him back to the bed. He’s never been a morning person, but he’s alone now after Kevin’s passing, and he has no choice but to get off his bed and clean up the store before 8 AM.

After freshening up, Marvin climbs down the stairs to see Trina already waiting in front of the store, Jason standing beside her playing some game on his phone. She must’ve forgotten the keys again. In annoyance that’s clearly displayed on his face, Marvin opens up the entrance and forces a smile at Trina.

The store was half a psychic reading store and half a florist shop—Marvin’s favorite aunt had inherited it to him without a reason, earning him a rift between him and his cousins for “stealing their mother’s love”. As a Jewish man, he had never been into this New Age shit, so he had turned the first floor of the store—formerly a witchy store which floor still smells like sage even until now—to a flower shop for Trina for her birthday. She pays the rent now after their divorce, especially because her flower business is far more successful than his store upstairs.

The second floor was still a psychic reading store. Turns out, a flair of the dramatic is easy money. There’s mechanism all over the store that gives the customer impression that what Marvin is doing is real. Marvin, on the other hand, knows that it isn’t.

“Are you okay?” Trina asks as soon as she walks in. “You look terrible.”

“I’m okay,” Marvin grumbles, “Forgot your keys again?”

“Marvin. Your feet are bleeding.”

“What?” Marvin raises his eyebrow. “What on earth are you talking about—“

He looks down to see that yes, his bare feet have left trails of blood all the way from the stairs. The pain only hits him now. He doesn’t know where it’s from. How can he get hurt without him knowing?

Then it hits him, and he feels like his legs weakening under him.

 

“You saw Kevin?”

He’s sitting on the backroom of the florist store, Trina fussing over his wound, handing him bandage for his feet after he’s successfully gotten the shards of glass out. Her store is open soon, but Marvin knows she’s worried about him enough to delay it for half an hour. 

“I really thought I was dreaming, so all I did was went back to sleep,” Marvin glances at where Jason is sitting to make sure he isn’t listening in. “But as you can see, apparently I did knock over the glass.”

“Marvin,” Trina’s face turns into a more serious expression. Her voice is low when she asks, “Are you on… drugs?”

Marvin scowls at her, suddenly angry at his ex-wife for thinking that way about him. Sometimes he really thinks Trina has a paranoia problem. He should really refer her to his psychiatrist. He’s been planning to do so even before their divorce, but he’d never gotten around to it.

“Who the fuck do you think I am, Trina?” he snaps with a hushed voice, careful not to let Jason hear what he’s saying. 

From her expression, he knows that she’s still suspicious.

“It’s not that—but after Kevin’s death, you’ve been dealing with the cops a lot, and maybe you need to take a break, which is why you’re—“

“Oh, fuck this,” Marvin angrily gets up. Deep down, he knows that she’s actually being reasonable, that she’s just worried about him, but he’s too stressed to process Trina’s complicated thoughts right now.

 

The psychic reading starts at 4 PM. For a long time, after he hired Kevin from a Craiglist advertisement, he’s been off the table and just sit around reading books while Kevin dealt with the customer. But now that he’s dead, Marvin’s forced to go through with the routine again. He actually hates it, but he needs the money before it’s time for Trina to pay the rent again.

His current customer is a blonde woman, a little bit ditzy, asking about the fortune of her restaurant business. Marvin rolls his eyes as she pours her worries about her lack of customers and how she keeps finding dead rats under the kitchen sink. 

His right foot steps on the pedal under the table that rattles the table at once. The woman seems taken aback, though excited, and Marvin knows that she’ll believe anything he says as long as he can keep it up.

“Your business will fluctuate for the next month, unfortunately. There’s a dark aura lounging on your kitchen. It’s very angry and bad for business. Miss, you have to purify your kitchen from negative energy,” Marvin starts his usual bullshit, “have you tried sa—“

He almost get a heart-attack when he sees Kevin appear on the back of the woman’s body, brows raised at him: “You’re really bad at this,” he says.

“Uh, you should. Sage your kitchen,” Marvin looks away from Kevin and tries to ignore him.

“Oh!” The woman exclaims. “I will… are you okay?”

Marvin realizes that he must’ve look really pale right now from panic. “I’m okay. Actually, I think that’s it for this session. I think I should also chase away negative energy from this place,” he says.

Kevin’s still there, standing on the side, arms crossed, after he shushes away the customer and flips the ‘open’ plate to ‘closed’. Trina seems like she’s already gone off and closed the store.

“I thought I was going insane,” he hisses to Kevin.

“I thought I was dead,” Kevin answers.

“What happen? You’re unable to pass on quietly or something?” Marvin asks. Maybe he should go to his psychiatrist again.

“I think it’s like that.”

“How did you die?”

“Huh?”

“The way you died was very unusual. How did you die?”

“I’m… not sure.”

Marvin raises an eyebrow. He thinks he should be more concerned that he’s actually talking to a ghost right now. Though Kevin doesn’t look like one. Sure, he looks a little pale and a little transparent, but it just looks like the usual him.

“Maybe I have an unfinished business with someone,” Kevin muses. “Maybe you could help!”

Yes, it’s definitely Kevin. Only him could still be optimistic in the face of death like this. 

“I’m not helping you,” Marvin grumbles.

“You know, my twin brother severed contact with our family. Maybe you can talk to him. I don’t know where he is, of course, but I like to think that he at least want to know that I have died.”

“I’m not helping you,” Marvin repeats.

“I want to pass on, Marvin!” Kevin pushes at his shoulder, but his hand only goes through Marvin’s arm like it was air. 

Marvin shivers, feeling like the temperature of the room has gone colder as soon as Kevin’s hand pushes into him. He wants to puke all of the sudden. Kevin pulls his hands away and stares at it in disbelief, like it just sinks in that he’s a ghost who cannot touch the living.

“Marvin—“

“Don’t touch me,” Marvin snaps at him.

Marvin looks away, but from the way the temperature of the room goes back to normal, he knows that Kevin’s already gone.

 

It’s been hours after Kevin’s disappearance and to his disbelief, Marvin starts to regret he had turned away Kevin that easily.

He lays on his bed, staring at the ceiling, going over thousands of possibilities that could happen. What if Kevin starts to haunt him and terrorize him? What if he will turn to a ghost once he died? What if this is God’s way of testing his faith? What if? What if—?

He shakes his head and decides to go out for a drink. He needs it to forget.

New York City’s air hits him in the face as soon as he steps outside. He sighs as he puts his hand inside his hoodie, his mind still trailing away, remembering how it feels to have that hand touch him.

It takes him five minutes to realize that he’s passed his usual bar, but he keeps walking. And walking, until he finds another bar on the edge of the street. Marvin stares at the door, at the neon lights in the windows, before he decides to walk in.

The music and bustle of nightlife greets him along the warmth of the place. Sure, he’s never been into mystical, aura crap, but he can feel the soft, welcoming aura that contrasts with his own place. He sits on the bar and orders Jack and Coke, and starts to drink alone, only accompanied by the texts Trina had sent him, advising him to take it easy at his feet for several days.

He isn’t paying attention when somebody takes a seat beside him. He looks up and scowls at once. “No way.”

Kevin Price—the ghost of him, at least—seemed like he had followed him this far and now is sitting on his side. He looks different from before, hair carefully styled and clothes far too fashionable, but Marvin knows it’s him.

“I told you I’m not helping you. Can you not follow me?” He snaps at him.

Kevin looks sincerely confused. “What?”

“You’re dead. How can you—?”

“I’m sorry,” Kevin says, “are you drunk?”

“Is there a problem over here?” The bartender, a dark-skinned woman with a glint on her eyes, approaches them with a frown. 

“I think he’s drunk, Charlotte,” Kevin shakes his head.

“Drunk? He only ordered one drink.”

“You can see him too?” Marvin exclaims.

“I take it back. Maybe he is drunk, Whizzer,” Charlotte stares at him in disbelief. “Mister, if you’re not well, I can contact your acquaintance—“

But Marvin isn’t listening.

Whizzer. Marvin stares at the man in front of him, realizing that his skin is full of life and he looks solid, not transparent like he’d been before. He gulps. Oh no. This isn’t Kevin. He should’ve known. But he still wants to vomit, and he now feels like he’s dizzy. He looks so much like Kevin, but he isn’t him.

The man named Whizzer stares at him with a frown. 

Marvin takes a deep breath and asks: “Do you have a twin brother named Kevin Price?”

Now it’s Whizzer turn to look like he wants to puke.


	2. Whizzer

The bar is closing and Marvin’s far, far away from being drunk. He’s forgotten why he’s here, especially after the whole room dims slightly as Whizzer hunches and grips at the edge of the bar, looking like he was going to faint. Marvin hasn’t said anything past that question. Whizzer doesn’t say anything either. Only the bartender—Charlotte—is quick enough to act, hushing both of them to the staff room at the back of the bar.

 The staff room was a small, crowded room full of boxes. There is a couch on the corner, beside a vanity mirror with the only decent lighting in that place. The lamp embraces the room with a weird tinge of green that makes the whole room looks sickly, reminiscent of emergency rooms in hospitals that Marvin always hates.

Marvin is waiting Whizzer to say something.

He doesn’t.

Marvin knows that he should stay, find an answer to all of this. Get Kevin’s ghost away from _his_ store. Maybe he can move away, but purchasing property in this economy is fucking impossible, and damned if he’s going to let his regular meetings with Jason away just because he has a ghost haunting him. He scratches at his itchy shoulder, where Kevin had touched him before. Anxiety starts to crawl in his body.

Whizzer lights up a cigarette in the silence. 

Marvin scrunches his nose but doesn’t say anything. 

“How do you know my brother?” 

The silence has seeps in so much that Whizzer’s voice is a surprise to Marvin. Whizzer looks somber, all the light that is in his eyes previously has disappeared. 

“I hired him from Craiglist. He was the psychic reader in my store,” Marvin explains quickly.

“Are you a Magi as well?” 

“ _What_?” Marvin stares at him in disbelief. Had he heard it wrong? What the fuck is even happening? “No, I don’t—what are you even talking about?” 

Whizzer raises an eyebrow at him before commenting. There’s a snark in his tone, a condescending voice that riles Marvin up. “Oh, I thought you were a… never mind. You’re _normal_. Though the fact that you can see his ghost is _interesting_ to say the very least.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“What’s your name again?”

“It’s Marvin.”

“Huh. Weird name for this day and age.”

Of course, he’s a fucking prick. “Your name is _Whizzer_.”

Whizzer laughs, an easy tone that travels across the room, light as a ringing bell. Marvin decides that he wants to get out. What, he’d already told Kevin’s brother that he’s dead, his job is here is done. Now he can go back to his normal life fooling customers into thinking that he does know what’s happening in their immediate future. He gets up under Whizzer’s eyes. He shouldn’t have gotten into the back room in the first place.

“How did he die?” Whizzer asks. His previous tone has disappeared, into a more serious, almost sad tone. He blows his smoke to the ceiling. He looks vulnerable, something that annoys Marvin even more.

“Strangled in his room. It seems like a murder, but the room was locked, and there’s no sign of forceful entry…” Marvin answers slowly. He still shivers at the thought of waking up and finding the store empty and hasn’t been cleaned already. He went to knock on Kevin’s door to wake him up, to no answer. His two weeks were full of interrogation from the cops who are baffled by the rotting corpse of a man who was still seen alive the night before. “His body looks like it’s been dead for more than a week. But it’s impossible. He was alive. I’ve talked to him the night before.”

Whizzer stares at him before pressing dead his cigarette. He smirks. “You’re really normal, aren’t you?”

Oh, that’s enough. Now he’s leaving.

Before he can get to the door, Charlotte appears and walks in, her forehead sweaty from the heat of the bar. She takes a good look at Marvin’s face before throwing Whizzer a look. “ _Whizzer_ ,” she warns.

“My twin brother is dead, Char, allow me to be insufferable,” Whizzer huffs dramatically.

“I don’t know what’s going on in this place, but I’m leaving,” Marvin states.

“You’re not safe,” Charlotte frowns.

“If he wants to die, let him,” Whizzer replies.

“ _Die_?” Marvin turns back to Whizzer. The man had stood up from where he was sitting, and is walking towards Marvin. Only now that Marvin realizes that he’s towering a few inches over him, and he smells nice. God, what the fuck, he shouldn’t be sniffing at someone so infuriating.

Whizzer’s hand touches his shoulder. Marvin’s breath hitches in his throat. His hand is warm, strangely warmer than he’s expecting. “Let me see your shoulder, Marvin.”

“Why?” Marvin steps away defensively.

“I know he touched you.”

Marvin should feel weird. He glances back at Charlotte. Charlotte hasn’t left, still watching them closely, giving Whizzer a look which meaning has missed Marvin entirely.

Marvin bites his lip and tugs at his hoodie, showing the skin on his shoulder.

“Ah, interesting,” Whizzer says. His hand traces Marvin’s skin. It makes his skin crawl.

What is that supposed to _mean_?

“It seems like my brother has let himself wander too close to where he’s not supposed to.”

Marvin glances at his shoulder. It looks normal. It’s the coldest part of his body, but it looks normal. His wish to puke increase. Questions races in his mind, but he decides to say nothing. He looks at Whizzer, waiting for an answer.

Whizzer smiles.

 _Fuck_.

 

 

He wakes up in a foreign bed. No. A couch. It’s been pulled out to serve as a bed, but it’s still more or less a couch. He’s still in the bar he visited last night—Charlotte’s bar—he doesn’t remember staying, but he feels so tired and it feels like he’s been drinking a lot since last night. He grumbles and pulls the blanket tighter over him. He hopes Trina brought a key this time.

“Hello, Sleeping Beauty,” a voice disturbs his sleep.

Marvin opens his eyes to find that he’s not sleeping alone in the couch. Whizzer is awake, half-clothed—he isn’t wearing a shirt—and in a flash, Marvin sits up, wide-awake, to move away from the warmth beside him.

“Why—“ he stutters, _fuck_ , “why am I here? Why are _you_ here?”

“I sleep here sometimes,” Whizzer yawns. The blanket he's using falls to his lap, and Marvin can see trails of healed scar on his chest. It looks like slashes from a sharp object, and the one in his shoulder looks new, fresh and still bandaged. “You decided to stay here while I fix up your shoulder. Still feeling the nausea?" 

Marvin feels okay. He doesn’t feel the nausea. But he’s tired, like a curtain of sleep has been pulled all over him. He has more questions than yesterday. “I…” He’s still wearing his hoodie, but the sight of Whizzer’s body embarrasses him. “I need to go. I have a store to open.”

“Great! I’ll come. I need to see my brother.”

“No,” Marvin snaps.

“Yes.”

“ _No_.”

“Yes.”

“I said no.”

“Look, do you want him to stay in your store forever?”

“I’ve told you what’s going on. He should pass quietly.”

Whizzer snorts. It’s condescending again, as if to say: _you know nothing_. Bile climbs up Marvin’s throat. “It’s not that easy, Marvin,” Whizzer gets up. “As I’m sure you realize, my brother isn’t a normal person. He didn’t die of natural causes.”

“You’re crazy.”

“God, you’re _impossible_ ,” Whizzer sighs. “We’ve established that you don’t know shit about this whole situation. Can you just go along with what I say?”

“No,” Marvin realizes he’s just being contrary at this point.

But he lets Whizzer follow him to the store.

 

 

Trina’s store is already opened when they arrive. As this is no longer a weekend, Jason’s nowhere to be found. Trina must have dropped him off at school.

Marvin pushes open the door. The bell rings above his head, and he sees Trina fumbling to greet him, only to see her customer smile dimming at once she sees that it’s Marvin who’s at the door. “Oh, welcome,” she says flatly. “I thought you were still sleeping. I called you—“ it’s at this moment she realizes he’s not alone, “oh. Hello. Welcome to our store. You’re Marvin’s friend?”

“Hey,” Whizzer smiles at Trina from behind Marvin’s shoulder. “Yes, I guess I am.”

“We’re going to go up.”

“Wait,” Trina stops him. “A customer stopped in. She said after she burned a sage… the whole place, the dead rats didn’t show up? She thanked you.”

“Oh,” Marvin says, surprised.

“Sage?” Whizzer snorts. “What is this, 1980?”

 _Oh, shut up_ , Marvin rolls his eyes and walks past Trina upstairs.

When he steps at the end of the ladder, Marvin feels the cold air hits his face. He shivers, his nausea coming back. What? This doesn’t feel like his store. Marvin steadies himself on the wall, only to be held from behind.

“This is bad,” he hears Whizzer’s voice in his right ear. “But you know, this store isn’t half-bad.”

There’s a crack on the wall he was holding on to, a crack that usually isn’t there. Dry leaves scattered everywhere in the floor, covering the red carpet. It really doesn’t feel like his store. Marvin gulps, suddenly feeling fear in his throat, instinct telling him that there’s something bad happening, there’s something _horrible_ …

“I’m here,” a voice steadies him.

He opens his eyes that he doesn’t know he just closed. Yes. Whizzer’s here. Whizzer Brown, alive, not lying on a bed in a hospital, he’s alive, breathing—

_What?_

Marvin shakes his head, confused at the vivid images that shows up in his brain.

In front of him, Whizzer smiles.

And it’s enough to ground Marvin back to reality.

Whizzer pulls out a knife and slashes it on his own palm, his blood trailing on his arm, and he whispers something that sounds like English but isn’t. Marvin stares at him and feels the sickening sense of familiarity in his throat.

The blood floats and sparkles under the dim light—light disappears from the room, leaving both of them in the darkness. The earth sways. And Marvin can suddenly see a darker shadow in the darkness, watching them. 

Hunting them.

The earth sways; a word appears in Marvin’s brain. _Apoculo_.

He tells it to the air.

Something in his hand shines, and he can see Whizzer’s face, glaring at him. Then the light in the room comes back. The shadow isn’t there anymore. But there’s a sense of dread in the air.

Whizzer scowls at him. “What the fuck did you do?”

Marvin is taken aback. He stares back confusedly at Whizzer.

Below, Trina screams.

 

 

 

Trina is okay. The flowers in her store, however, aren’t. 

Marvin stares in confusion as he sees all the flowers that used to be fresh when they walk in, that he knows arrives this morning, all had wilted, dried or otherwise fallen dead on the floor. Whizzer walks to a panicking Trina, holds her hand, and Marvin can only watch as she slowly sits down on her seat and closes her eyes.

Then Whizzer turns to him. “You—you did something.” 

“I don’t know,” Marvin says. 

“You said you aren’t a Magi!” 

“I don’t know!” Marvin yells back at him. 

“Then explain how you just recklessly expelled the demon away!” 

“Demon? What the fuck? I don’t know, Whizzer!” 

Whizzer groans in frustration. “You didn’t do the expulsion properly. The demon just left, _not_ expelled. Only God knows where he’s at right now.” 

“You’re fucking insane.” 

“No, _you_ are,” Whizzer snaps at him. 

“Get out,” Marvin snaps back. 

They stare at each other for a moment. It feels like an eternity. Then slowly, Whizzer turns away and leaves. The sense of dread leaves with him. Marvin glances at Trina, who’s asleep on her seat. 

He has a feeling it won’t be the last time he’s seen him.

 

 

 

Marvin visits his psychiatrist. Mendel Weisenbachfeld opens the door and frowns at him. 

“You’re not on the list today,” he says. 

“I think I’m going crazy,” Marvin tells him. 

Mendel has the look of a concerned man for once. “What’s wrong?” 

Marvin realizes he can’t actually tell him. He _would_ sound insane. Marvin raises his hand to stroke the bridge of his nose, only to realize that there’s a mark on his skin that he hasn’t seen before. It looks like a drawing, bulging on the skin, like a healed scar. Marvin stares at it confusedly. 

He looks down to see Mendel staring at the same symbol. 

“Oh God,” Mendel says. “Oh God, oh God, oh no.” 

“What?” Marvin asks. 

“You remembered, don’t you?” 

“ _What_?” He doesn’t believe what’s happening. What is wrong with the people around him? 

“You have to go,” Mendel tries to close the door on him.

Marvin manages to hold the door before it’s fully closed. What? “What the fuck, Mendel?” Sure, he’s _his_ psychiatrist, but he also has known Mendel for a long time to speak to him a little rudely, especially when he’s being like this. “Remembered what? Hey!” 

Mendel looks terrified. “Don’t ask me questions. I can’t answer.” He tries to close the door again, with a little more force this time, but now Marvin’s blocking the whole door with half of his body, which makes it difficult for him to do anything. 

“Tell me.” 

He stares at his psychiatrist. His psychiatrist stares him back. Mendel let go of his grip on the door. It swings open with a creak. 

“I’ll tell you, but you need to understand that it’s bad for you.” 

Oh, Marvin is going to love this, he knows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> an update... because i have no self-control. comments will be appreciated, it certainly will makes the update more frequent! <3


	3. Marvin's Giddy Seizures

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Can you spot all the references? <3

He’s sitting on his usual seat, where he usually pours out his problem. This time, it isn’t him who talks—after Marvin explains what had happened, Mendel looks more and more like he wants to run away, but he doesn’t. He just sits there and stares at Marvin as blood slowly leaves his face.

Marvin explains a little about what was happening. When he’s finished, Mendel pours him a glass of water and puts it beside him. Marvin only takes a sip, and even that suspiciously. He knows Mendel is—and has been—hiding something for him. 

“Okay, so: from where you were young, you always have these seizures,” Mendel starts after he coughs. “You would be in hysterics in random times of the day with no actual reason. Your mother used to be frightened of you, but she wants to help, so she did the sanest thing she could think of: she started bringing you to professional help.” 

Marvin’s brow is furrowed. He doesn’t exactly remember this. Yes, his mother had been assisting him to psychiatrists all his life, but this is the first time he’d heard of the seizures, and he’s almost 30, for God’s sake.

“There, you will say that you have another Marvin in your head. But only when you come of age that weird things start happening—things that doesn’t make sense to the world around you. So when your mother fell mysteriously sick, it comes to your estranged aunt to take care of you. Do you remember this?” 

Marvin shakes his head. All he remembers that his mother had lung cancer and he started living with his aunt. 

“Luckily for you, your aunt decided to do the best thing: she brought you to me to block out _that_ Marvin when you’re 16, because you have a very terrible seizure where you actually tried to kill yourself in your own room. And when this happens—the whole house went sick. Only your aunt was spared.”

It feels wrong to hear these things about himself that he doesn’t know. “I don’t remember.”

“Before I block out that Marvin, you used to tell me that you have this memories that isn’t yours—about Trina, about Jason, about women named Cordelia and Charlotte? Far before you actually married Trina and named your child with her Jason?”

“I don’t remember,” Marvin repeats, but there’s something bitter in his throat that indicates otherwise. “You’re supposed to give me peace, Mendel, you’re a psychiatrist, you’re scaring me even further. This doesn’t make sense.”

Mendel stares at him for a moment. The way he stares at him makes Marvin’s stomach churn in disgust, in anger. “Marvin, I’m _not_ a psychiatrist,” Mendel says finally. “Your aunt brought me to ‘erase’ that Marvin from your head, so you can live peacefully, so you can stop hurting other people. After you put your cousins to the hospital, most of your family avoids you, you see, so she gave the store to you.”

“No way. My cousins hate me because she inherited that store to me.”

“Do they really?” Mendel asks, and he sounds sad. Pitiful. Like he’s pitying him. Marvin is silent. Do they? Do they? 

He can’t even trust himself right now. He feels like a false person living inside someone else’s life. 

“That symbol in your hand, it’s always been there, but you can’t usually see it. My magic keeps it hidden. It’s a memory blocker, to get that Marvin away from your mind. But looking that you can see it now, the seal must’ve been disturbed,” Mendel continues in a serious tone that makes him seem like he’s not making all of this up right now. “It must’ve been the death of Kevin Price that disturbs it. You haven’t seen that much weird things before, right?” 

God, now fucking _Mendel_ is crazy too. He’s talking about magic too, like Whizzer did. Like… Whizzer? 

“Mendel,” he says, “have I mentioned someone named—Whizzer?” He hasn’t said Whizzer’s name to Mendel, as he keeps referring him as ‘the crazy guy who looks like Kevin’ or ‘Kevin’s twin brother’. 

Mendel looks surprised. 

“Oh, you have a lot to say about Whizzer Brown,” Mendel mutters.

 

 

 

He’s gone back to Charlotte’s bar that night, mind busy from all the information Mendel had told him. The bar hasn’t opened yet—the neon sign hasn’t even lit up as the sun had only came down—but a blonde woman steps out from the bar with a bright smile. Marvin realizes he recognizes her from her visit to his store. Her face lights up when she sees him.

“Oh, it’s you!” She waves excitedly.

“Oh. Hey,” Marvin greets, feeling like his gloom contrasts her cheerful exterior. “How’s your restaurant?”

“The dead rats stop appearing, all thanks to you. The sage thing really works! I’m very glad I visited your store.” She explains. Her carefully curled hair sways in the air. “More customers have been entering my restaurant after the dead rats is disappearing. It’s really relieved, I thought we were going to deal with those scary health inspectors! Are you here for the bar? You’ve come a long way from your store.” 

“I’m here for…” Marvin trails off. Why would this person know Whizzer? “Yes,” he answers finally. “It hasn’t opened yet?”

“Oh, yes. I know the owner. She’s busy and still preparing now, though. Would you like to go to my restaurant first? It’s across the street. I want to thank you with a dinner.”

It’s the smile that finally melts Marvin. He shrugs. What harm would it do? “Sure,” he says. 

“I’m Cordelia, anyway.” 

Cordelia. He’s heard of that name before. Where was it? “Marvin,” Marvin says, still trying to remember.

 

 

Her restaurant is a diner, but there’s no customer and only a bored-looking cashier is hanging out there, a dark-skinned woman that smiles at Cordelia as they walk in. 

“Hey, Nabulungi!” Cordelia greets her. Marvin nods at her, half in politeness, half imitating Cordelia’s action. “Has there been any customer since I’m gone?”

“Unfortunately, empty, but we have several more customers than yesterday.” 

“This is Marvin, who suggested I sage the place,” Cordelia gestures at Marvin, who only shrugs. 

“Hey, Marvin! Thanks for saving our restaurant.”

“Nabulungi is my business partner. We opened this restaurant together, and take turn as the waitress and the cashier. We only have one other employee at the back, the chef, but I usually help to cook anyway because there isn’t that much customers…” Cordelia explains. “My chef is the one who suggested I go to your store, actually! But he said that you’re not the usual psychic there?” 

Marvin realizes that the chef must have been one of Kevin’s regulars. He nods. 

“Oh, sit, sit, we’ll cook you something!” Cordelia pushes him to sit at one of the corner. He complies and waits, watches as Cordelia goes behind the counter and then to the kitchen, yelling “Connor!” 

To his horror, he sees a glimpse of Whizzer on the back, right before the boards separating the kitchen from the counter closes. 

Oh. Whizzer’s here. He’s here. 

Panic comes back to his throat. 

He sits in silence, watching his phone as Jason texts him to notify him that Trina has arrived back safely, but she might not open the store tomorrow. He replies that he’ll visit later. It feels like forever before Cordelia finally comes out and serves him a plate of pasta. 

“Enjoy!” Cordelia grins. 

“Cordelia,” he calls before Cordelia walks away, “Do you know Whizzer?” 

“Whizzer?” She seems to think for a second. “Oh! Whizzer. Yes. I do know him.” 

“Is he at the back? Can I meet him?” 

Cordelia stares at him in confusion. She frowns. “Whizzer isn’t here, Marvin. There’s just Connor back there… I mean, he eats here from time to time, but he hasn’t visited in a while.” 

Marvin stares back in confusion. 

But he’s seen him. 

Maybe he is going crazy. 

“Are you okay?” Cordelia decides to ask after Marvin is silent for quite some time. 

“Okay,” Marvin finally replies. He turns to the pasta. It’s linguini alfredo. This is his favorite food, miraculously, and it looks good. When they were still together, Trina used to cook it often whenever she’s in a good mood, to make sure that Marvin’s sour mood doesn’t ruin hers. He realizes he’s hungry, and he lifts up his fork to eat. 

“Connor cooked that. It’s not our usual menu, but he guessed that it would be your favorite.” 

Marvin’s blood turns cold. He remembers that the first time he had seen Kevin Price—when he was interviewing him for the job—Kevin had guessed at once that that’s his favorite food. Marvin merely shrugged it off, blaming it on dumb luck, or guessing that Kevin had googled his Facebook or something. 

He realizes it’s not Whizzer he’s seen. 

He doesn’t want to eat this anymore.

 

 

 

He eats it, very slowly, much to the worried glances of Cordelia. He tries to pay. Cordelia refuses. After a weird fumble of politeness, he leaves and goes across the street. 

The bar’s opened by the time he arrives. He steps inside and doesn’t see Whizzer, but Charlotte looks up to him when he approaches the bar. She takes a look at his face and shoots him, as if knowing already what’s in his mind: “What’s wrong?” 

“I need to see Whizzer,” Marvin tells her at once. 

“He hasn’t come here yet. As you’ve noticed, he doesn’t actually live here,” Charlotte replies. 

“Do you know how to contact him? It’s an emergency.” Marvin tries to keep his voice steady, but he knows he’s panicking. 

Charlotte takes a look at him before she turns away, pours him a glass of whiskey that looks expensive. She slides it towards him, and with it a paper; written on it a phone number and initials: _W. B._

 

 

Whizzer comes to the bar half an hour later. He’s wearing a coat, a coat that looks like it steps out of some fantasy land, something that doesn’t belong to the busy streets of New York City, and Marvin notices he’s staring. The man is handsome and attractive—something he noticed with Kevin before—he knows this, but he’s also infuriating the way Kevin Price isn’t, and Marvin had known his name from when he was a teenager.

He doesn’t know what this means. 

“What’s wrong?” Whizzer’s voice is almost gentle when he sits on the empty seat in front of him. He had heard the rushed panic in Marvin’s voice over the phone. Charlotte’s off dealing with a customer, leaving them alone. 

“I saw Kevin’s ghost again,” he explains hurriedly. “Across the street. At Cordelia’s restaurant.” 

“Ah, yes, I should’ve guessed, the dead rats,” Whizzer says. “Charlotte. Come here. You got to close the bar.” 

Charlotte walks to them, looking concerned. “Whizzer. Your clothing…” 

“It isn’t the time. Just pretend that I was at a costume party. My twin brother has appeared across the street, at Delia’s place,” Whizzer says as he gets up. “I think she’s in trouble. Have she come to your store before to meet Kevin?” 

“No,” Marvin shakes his head, “No—actually, yesterday’s the first time she came. But her chef is a regular of Kevin’s.” 

“She can still be in danger,” Charlotte states hurriedly. She turns to the bar, to the amount of people around her, and starts yelling that she’s got something to do that forces her to close the bar. Around the room, a collective groan, but most of them listens to her and starts to pack up. 

Whizzer’s already preparing to leave. Marvin stares at him, and finds that he suddenly wants to cry. _Whizzer, Whizzer Brown_ … He can only repeat that name, tastes it in his mind’s tongue, savoring it. 

Whizzer notices his stare and stares back. 

Something is stuck on Marvin’s throat. 

He wants to say something. Yet the words do not come out. He realizes he doesn’t even know what he wants to say. All he knows is that name and how much it means to him, how he can feel the earth rotation stops for a second with those eyes. 

“Let’s go,” Whizzer commands. “And don’t do something reckless like back at your store again. I will not be responsible of your mess.” 

“I don’t even know what I did,” Marvin defenses himself. “I only said what’s on my mind.” 

“You don’t know what you’re doing,” Whizzer says. “If you want to come, then I suggest not saying anything.” 

Marvin knows he wants to come. 

To his surprise, he nods.

 

 

 

Cordelia’s restaurant looks normal for something haunted. Though the ‘OPEN’ sign has been abruptly flipped to the point that the ropes are tangled, there’s nothing that indicates that the haunting Marvin has seen had been real—he wants to convince himself that he’s imagined it, that he had seen Whizzer and they’re all just messing with him.

He’s standing beside Whizzer, who smells like expensive cologne whose sample are always being given out in department stores. He had left his coat at the bar, and Marvin can see the slight muscular build he has, how his clothes are perfectly fitted, perfectly pressed, like he’s mulled his appearance before he gets out of the bar.

“Don’t do anything,” Whizzer grumbles, and Marvin realizes he’d been caught staring.

Charlotte’s walking ahead of them, pushing the diner’s door open. The door complies easily under her palm. The bell over their head rings, signaling their arrival. Marvin steps in last. He’s surprised to see that the diner looks the same as previously. 

“Where did you see him?” asks Whizzer. 

“In the kitchen, back there.” 

Cordelia and Nabulungi is nowhere to be found. There’s a half-eaten pancake on the counter, a view that somehow bother Marvin.

They step carefully towards the kitchen. He hears Charlotte’s gasp first before he can even see what was going on. 

Cordelia is sitting on the floor, leaning on the counter, with Nabulungi on her lap. Charlotte rushes to her and lifts up her chin, trying to make sure she’s okay. Both of them were unconscious. On the other side of the room: a clutter of pans hit the floor with a loud sound. Something is peeking from behind the wall, watching them.

“Kevin,” Whizzer calls. “I’m here for you—“ 

“ _Stay back_!” He yells. The sound seems like it’s coming from all around them.

 “You know I’m here to help you,” Whizzer sounds slightly annoyed. “What did you do? What demon did you have a deal with? We’re supposed to be priests, Kevin, you’re going to hell at this point—“ 

“I didn’t have a deal with demon,” the sound travels, echoing across the room. “I’m only here to help. I promised Connor I will help him and—and—I don’t know what happened, but I slept one morning and realized I didn’t wake up again—“ The voice cracks, like he's a ghost on the verge of breaking down.

“What happened, Kevin?” Whizzer’s voice softens. There’s love inside those words, a lost love that’s long been forgotten, and Marvin suddenly hears a soft laugh from behind him.

He turns. There’s no one there. Just the door. But he’s sure he heard of it. 

 _Hello, best friend_.

The world freezes. No, Marvin _feels_ like his entire body has frozen in place. 

But it feels entirely, weirdly familiar. Like an old song he hasn’t heard for years, but he’s been singing for a while, though he doesn’t know what the song is.

 _Should we watch you cry_?

And then everything turns to black.

 

 

  

“ _Marvin_.”

Something is shaking him. He feels dizzy. He pushes the hands from his shoulder away, more comfortable with the slumber than the waking world. But the hands were stubborn and keeps trying to shake him, and he wants to _justsleeppleasejustleavehimalonehefeelsmorecomfortable_ — 

Then he feels someone slap him.

He opens his eyes to find Whizzer staring at him. 

“I told you not to do anything,” Whizzer yells. 

“Let me sleep, Whizzer,” he snaps, pushing Whizzer with as much force as he could. Whizzer doesn't even budge. “Why did you fucking slap me?” 

“Marvin!” 

The sense of urgency, the _fear_ , in Whizzer’s voice is the only thing that drags Marvin back to the living. He suddenly realizes that his body is wet. Droplets of water falls from the ceilling to the back of Whizzer’s head, then drips from the beautiful corners of his face down to Marvin’s face. 

It’s raining. Whizzer has him in his arms, still inside the kitchen, and it’s _raining_ inside. Whizzer feels warm and comfortable, despite the water all around them. Then Marvin realizes it’s the second stupidest thing he’s thought of that week, because there’s harshness and anger in Whizzer’s eyes, and it’s directed to _him_.

Marvin is already sleepy, his nausea has come back, and _now_ he feels like shit.

“What… why is it raining?” He asks, feeling disoriented. 

“You did that,” Whizzer’s angry, he knows, “you did _all of this_." 

And it’s at that moment when Marvin realizes, the new, kitchen furniture—the shining stainless steel, the new stove, the wood—everything is _rotting_ , like it’s been abandoned for a hundred of years. He remembers Trina’s flowers, how it all had died instantly.

Marvin suddenly wants to go back to his store and not get out, for weeks, for _months_ , as long as it’s allowed. 

Whizzer holds him and doesn’t let go. 

“I want to go home,” he whispers. 

“No,” Whizzer refuses. “You’re coming back with me.” 

Marvin doesn’t want to. 

He’s so tired that he couldn’t even muster a rejection.

 


	4. The Aftermath

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey! i wanted to update it this week (which is stupid bc i'm busy with school work) lmao. this is a shorter chapter than the previous ones, but next chapter will be more loaded. ty for reading!

In the last thirty minutes, he discovered four things: Kevin has disappeared again, Connor has ran away as soon as he saw him, and he’d ruined Cordelia and Nabulungi’s kitchen, but at least they were okay, and he was hit by the realization that he doesn’t have enough money to replace those equipments. Oh, and rain had fallen inside that kitchen for 15 minutes of him being catatonic, not responding to anyone until Whizzer ran out of his patience and slapped him.

Charlotte had reassured him that this was fixable and she would fix it. But now, he has to go with Whizzer to make sure he doesn’t ruin anything again.

He’s now at the back of a bus, heading to destinations unknown, half-awake, with the reassurance of a quiet Whizzer beside him. He hasn’t said anything since they’ve left the restaurant. There’s a new bandage in Whizzer’s arm that he’s been covering with his coat.

“Don’t sleep,” Whizzer warns as his head leans on Whizzer’s shoulder. Whizzer is several inches taller and with too much edges to be comfortable, but he’s warm and _oh Marvin is so tired_.

Marvin swallows back a yawn before answering, with more edge than he’s been meaning to, “You’re not that comfortable to sleep on. Don’t flatter yourself.”

Whizzer chuckles. “You’re a dick, you know?” But he reaches to pat the side of Marvin’s head and it takes Marvin more than half of his energy to not lean to the touch.

Marvin sleeps.

 

 

 

 

When he’s awake, he’s in an unfamiliar small room, huddled below a soft blanket that feels too comfortable for him to move. He blinks. He doesn’t remember getting off the bus, nor the features of stranger’s furniture all around him. He wants to sit up, but the warmth’s practically tying him down to the bed in a soft bondage that he doesn’t mind surrendering to.

Someone beside him moves, and Marvin suddenly remembers his own name and of course: _Whizzer_. Last night’s events begin to crawl towards his consciousness, though he still can’t remember why he lost his consciousness at the first place.

He sits up. He doesn’t know where the bathroom is, but he can search for it. The bed shifts under him as he stands up and starts walking around inside that apartment, searching for the toilet.

The first door he opens: cabinets full of colorful liquids inside vials, few of them shining on its own even with only the lights behind him shining n it. He slams the door closed and hears the _ting_ of glass trembling above the wood.

The second door he opens: an indoor small garden full of roses. It’s nice but still not the toilet. He closes the door gently.

The third door: kitchen. It seems untouched. Marvin can see, to his disgust, a thick layer of dust in the counter.

The fourth door is a library full of books he’s never heard of. His finger traces the spines, finding no titles, only names, names of people he’s never heard of and names that he feels like he’d seen before. There’s a couch in the center of the room, accompanied by a small table housing a table lamp that looks like it was bought off IKEA and three books stacked, one on the top slightly opened.

He doesn’t take Whizzer for the kind of guy who reads.

Before he can touch it, he hears a cough from behind him. He’s halfway scared that it’s the voice from the night before. But it’s Whizzer, leaning on the door wearing something that suspiciously looks like satin pajamas.

“You sure are nosy,” he remarks.

“I was searching for the toilet,” Marvin answers.

“Oh, please, like I haven’t heard that excuse thousands of times.”

Marvin steps away from the book and turns his attention directly to Whizzer. His hair isn’t styled yet—a strand falls to his forehead, but he still looks like he’s the most beautiful person Marvin ever meet in his life. Marvin has to remind himself that doesn’t make sense, because his twin brother has the same face as him.

Marvin opens his mouth to say something. Then he closes it again.

“There’s something weird about you,” Whizzer remarks as he gestures Marvin to get out of there. “And I’m not letting you hurt other people again before I know what’s truly going on. Currently you’re my responsibility, Mr. Marvin.”

Marvin walks out, but only because he really wants to go to the bathroom. It has nothing to do with what Whizzer wants. “I’m not sure what you’re insinuating, Whizzer, and I’m not your responsibility.”

“Be nice to me and I’ll show you how nice it is to be _my_ responsibility,” teases Whizzer from behind him. Marvin rolls his eyes although there is a nagging desire to turn to Whizzer and wipe the grin he can hear from his voice off his face. “You know, I find that hard to believe considering you’ve said a lot of things around me and ended up doing the opposite of that.”

“What are _you_?” he turns away sharply suddenly.

He regrets it at once.

He didn’t realize Whizzer was right behind him. Whizzer bumps into him, their faces close together. And idiotically, Marvin freezes.

Whizzer, unaffected, put his hands on Marvin’s shoulder and pushes him gently one step behind. “I could explain if you only calm down for a little and not fuck around my house without my consent. You could’ve walked into something dangerous. Please sit down on my couch.”

“I wasn’t trying to—“

“Sit down, Marvin. Or should I push you?”

Marvin turns his head to find the couch and sits down on it, watches as a smirk appears on Whizzer’s face at the compliance. Whizzer follows and sits across of him, smiling at him as soon as he sits down.

“I am a Magi.”

“Oh, come on.”

“Listen first,” Whizzer huffs. He runs his hand through his (impossibly perfect) hair. “There’s magic in the world that you normal people have no idea of—though I won’t say you’re a normal person… our population isn’t that much, but we are scattered all over the world. Before you ask how we don’t get found out, that’s where people like me and Charlotte come to play. Our job is to make sure that other Magi don’t wreak havoc in the world… or to fix some things if the damage is already done, which what happened back there on the restaurant.”

Marvin rubs his face before asking: “How am I supposed to believe this?”

“You made rain appear indoor and make the restaurant’s appliances rot at once. Do I really need to convince you? You’ve seen it yourself.”

“Do excuse _me_ for needing time to process this.”

“Oh, no, take your time.”

He stares at the guy in front of him, someone who looks so normal that Marvin is half-sure he’d been punked. But he doesn’t have explanation to what happened. And he _does_ do these “magic” on his own. “You said before that you thought Kevin had done something he wasn’t supposed to do. What do you mean by that?” Marvin asks after a long silence.

“Our family came from a long blood line of priests dedicated into worshipping a portal to other universes. Do you know these things called ley lines? At the center of those ley lines, the cloak that separates one world of another is very thin—and we as priests are the one who guard that place so that nothing passes.”

“And what could pass?”

“Oh, many things. Other normal people, animals, and oh, of course—demons.”

“…Sure.” Marvin makes a face at him.

“It’s not exactly demons in a religion sense, so don’t make that face on me, Mr. Marvin,” Whizzer says with a snort. “It’s actually more like a being from another world that holds ability to convert life into energy. They have consciousness, so Magi can invite those energy to themselves to do a miracle but at great cost. The problem about this is when a Magi uses their power to do any magical thing, we use our own power to do so. But when we are involving demon to do things out of our power, there still needs to be a _source_ of energy. Can you guess where this source came from?”

Marvin stares at the meaningful look that Whizzer is giving him, as if provoking him into thinking the answer on its own. He frowns. Is he supposed to guess…? He’s barely following as it is. But then he remembers: the flowers, the rot around him. Something inside him goes cold.

“I see that you’ve pieced it together,” Whizzer leans on his own thigh and puts his chin on his hands. “I thought that it was Kevin who did it. Though I severed contact with my family, he was always a good kid, you know? He really loves to help other people, he won’t hurt anyone—I thought that was why he ended up using his own life force to do a miracle. But after what happened at the restaurant… it’s not him, isn’t it? Now, Mr. Marvin, can you explain how you manage to possess a demon? What miracle did you do that you managed to kill my twin brother?”

He looks down to see his hands trembling. “I… don’t know,” he mutters softly. He feels his entire head wanting to explode. He was the one—he killed Kevin Price? “I didn’t do it. I swear I didn’t.”

“Maybe not consciously,” Whizzer smiles sadly. “Considering you’ve also lost your consciousness back there at the restaurant, it’s not that impossible to hypothesize that you had done it out of your consciousness.”

“I wouldn’t do that… to Kevin.”

“I’m sure you didn’t do it consciously. You don’t have any control towards your magic.”

“I _didn’t_ …” Marvin stops, feeling panic rising to his throat. He suddenly feels like he’s losing air, like there’s a pure white heat in his chest that is choking him. “I—didn’t—“ he grasped at his chest, trying to claw the heat out, to no avail.

He’s going to die.

He’s going to die without knowing why does he know this man’s name since he was a child.

He’s going to—

Coldness crawls from his lips to his chest, his hand falling to his lap once the heat disappears. Is he dead? He opens his eyes and finds somebody kissing him. He must be dead. Then they pull away and it registers: it’s Whizzer. There’s tears in Marvin’s cheeks that he doesn’t realize has fallen.

“Don’t panic,” Whizzer mutters between them. He stares at Marvin, his brown eyes looking concerned that the other is crying. He raises his hand to wipe tears on Marvin’s cheeks. “Why are you crying?”

Marvin is stunned. He stares at the beautiful face in front of him. He realizes he wants more of that kiss. But he doesn’t move. “I… have seizures,” he answers.

 

 

 

He tells Whizzer about Mendel over a cup of tea, mostly about the other Marvin, completely glossing over the fact that he had known of Whizzer and the people he now knows since he was young. The other listens attentively, sipping his own tea, seemingly not as affected about the kiss as Marvin, who can’t stop staring at the other’s lips. When he finishes talking, his mug was half empty, and Marvin finds himself staring at the scattered tea leaves at the bottom, trying not to think about the kiss especially since the other party doesn’t care that much about it.

“It seems like the demon has been with you for a while,” Whizzer remarks after he finishes talking. He puts down his cup on the table and stares at Marvin. He’s sitting beside Marvin now instead of across of him. “Considering that this Mendel manage to suppress the demon for a while, he must be a powerful Magi… though I’ve never heard of him before. Weird, considering that I’m supposed to know everyone in this city.”

Marvin stays silent. He doesn’t know how to answer that. He’s asking to himself if he needs to say those things—about knowing Whizzer.

“He’s powerful but not very smart,” Whizzer adds, he’s running his hair through his hair again. “I think we need to meet him. Personally, I would say that he should undo the magic on you so that we could expel that demon from you once and for all.”

But what good would it do? He doesn’t know how Whizzer would react. Maybe he will be creeped out by the fact that Marvin spends his youth obsessing over him. Maybe he will be afraid of him. Maybe he will hate him.

“Marvin,” Whizzer puts his hand on his shoulder. Marvin flinches from the touch, pulling away. He glances at Whizzer, who slowly pulls away his hand with a sad smile. “If you’re thinking about the kiss, don’t worry. It was nothing. I’m sorry for kissing you without consent, but you were having a… seizure. It was hard to transfer my energy to you so you can calm down. Kissing you seems like a wise choice to get to your energy at once.”

 “I… okay,” Marvin replies.

He doesn’t want it to be _nothing_.

“Get some shower, you can borrow my clothes—I’ll leave it in front of the bathroom later. We’re going to see Mendel today.” And with that, Whizzer gets up and points at a blue door on one side of the wall. “That’s the bathroom, anyway. You were searching for it earlier.”

With that, Whizzer gets up and walks away, leaving Marvin alone with his thoughts. He doesn’t want it to be nothing. Because it feels good. It feels familiar. It feels like nothing like his kisses with Trina: chaste, without passion. It feels… perfect. Whizzer feels perfect and familiar, like someone he has known for years.

He knows he should’ve said something.

But he also knows it’s too late.


	5. Distare

_Water_.

The shower is warm as it hits his shoulder, relaxing him, but his body tenses as his mind explored what had happened in the last few days. And the fact that Whizzer said that he had killed Kevin… which is what the cops had suspected, anyway. Will he go to jail? So far, only Whizzer knows it. Will he rat him out to the cops… or whatever it was the Magi equivalent of law enforcement?

Unconsciously, his finger touches his lips. It feels cold despite the warm water, like Whizzer’s lips as their lips touched. Marvin closes his eyes and presses his forehead against the tiles, letting water run over his skin as he thinks of the kiss and how easy it was for Whizzer to shrug it off.

God, he’s such a fuck up.

He steps out of the shower once he’s done. Tugging the towel that’s hanging near the sink, he dries his body with that as he stares at his expression in the mirror. He feels odd. He feels peculiar. He feels tired, but the face that stares back at him doesn’t seem so. He seems healthier than ever, almost younger, like the ghost of age that’s already crawling into him in the last few years has been exorcised.

The towel is wrapped around his hips as he pushes the door open to find a pair of clothes, folded neatly, is put on the table beside the bathroom’s door. He pulls it inside and put the clothes against the light. It isn’t his usual style—he doesn’t do it on purpose, but he feels like his entire wardrobe consists of cheap plaids he bought on sale sections, occasionally thrifted—it smells like Whizzer. He puts it on and feels like it hugs his body, _perfect_. Marvin wonders if this is how it feels to be Whizzer, to feel like he’s on the perfect position, with the perfect clothes, in contrast of Marvin, who always feels out of place, like he’s making up for something he doesn’t possess.

When he gets out after being fully dressed, he finds Whizzer lighting a cigarette on the couch. The green light of his lighter disappears as soon as he flicks the zippo closed. Again, Marvin scrunches his face in dislike. Their eyes catch but Whizzer looks away as soon as it does.

“Why do we have to see Mendel?” He shoots as he tugs at the bands of his pants, feeling like it’s too tight. “Can’t you just take off the magic on your own?”

Whizzer huffs a puff a smoke to the air. “Simple magic like memory blocking is a pain in the ass to remove. It’s easier just to go to the source to cancel it.”

Marvin’s thoughts flies to Mendel, the nervous, erratic energy the man radiates, like he’s always looking over his shoulder. It feels odd to think the man as a wizard. He’s always practical, although always paranoid. (He reminds him of Trina before their divorce: always bound tight, paranoia in their eyes.) If anything, he seems like he’s a cartoon of a mad scientist.

He watches as Whizzer puts off his cigarette and walks past him to the bathroom. Their hands brush as he passes by. He leaves a scent of menthol in the air that Marvin finds he does not outwardly loathe.

He won’t mind the taste of cigarette if he kisses him again…

“You’re a mess,” he mutters to himself. He chases away the thoughts and puts his ass on the couch, waiting for his not-friend to come back.

 

 

 

 

They’re sitting at the back of the bus again, heading to Mendel’s place. This time, there’s a space between them that radiates ice, even in the middle of crowded bus. Marvin busies himself with texting Jason who tells him that Trina’s been sleeping since last night. Whizzer busies himself with his own cellphone, swiping pictures, and it takes every inch of Marvin’s resolve not to peek.

“Is Cordelia okay?” Marvin asks when the silence feels unbearable. Of course, the truth is, there’s a low chatter in the bus, courtesy of a pair of high school boys fooling around at the middle part of the bus, but there’s a gaping hole between Whizzer and him in form of a kiss, and it bothers Marvin to no end.

“She’s in shock, but she’ll be okay. Charlotte is taking care of her… and Nabulungi also.” Whizzer answers without as much as raising his eyes from his phone. “I think more than her and Naba, the ones we should worry about is the fact that Kevin’s ghost is haunting Connor McKinley, who’s still God-knows-where at this point.”

“Is Kevin and McKinley together a bad thing?” There are unsaid words that Marvin didn’t want to speak of here: _it isn’t like he’s the one who murdered your brother_.

“McKinley isn’t a Magi. My brother should not be helping him _that_ way at the first place. His exposure to ghost—a vengeful, murdered ghost, if you’ve somehow forgotten—is worrying to say the very least.”

“It could be worse.”

Whizzer looks up this time. His right brow raised, he looks at Marvin with disdain. Marvin shifts uncomfortably in his seat, feeling his jaw tense, ready with a fight in his lips. “That’s a very good point. I think you can make things much, much worse with that unused magical energy, especially if influenced by a demon.” There’s something shining in his eyes that Marvin does not recognize.

“ _If_ influenced,” Marvin leans in, making sure their faces are close.

“You are easily influenced, Marvin,” Whizzer replies. Instead of pulling away like Marvin thought he would, he presses his face just a bit closer, close enough for Marvin to feel his air on his cheek, but not close enough to touch. “As you told me earlier this is you with memory blocker on. What happens when it’s off and you lose control like you did earlier? What happens when it takes your body and does whatever it is that it wants? I’m sorry, but didn’t you say you made your entire family _sick_?”

A taste of fury climbs into Marvin’s tongue, knotting it tight, wounding him up. He knows that he should say something, to reply the person in front of him with more poison. It is unlike him to be tongue-tied at a time like this. Whizzer is snappy. Whizzer is mean. But he is not downright spiteful. Not the Whizzer in front of him.

“What the fuck is your problem?!” He settles at last when his brain fails to form a better jab. “I didn’t say anything that warrant those words. You think I want to make that happen? Do you think it feels good to be hated by your own family?! Do you think it feels great for _everyone_ to hate you?!” He’s raising his voice now, earning unnecessary attention from people around them. Their stares are pricking his skin.

He pushes his body to stand at the same time the bus is halting. He knows it’s childish, but he leaves Whizzer behind him and gets off the bus.

It isn’t until he is a few steps away into the pavement that he feels a hand around his wrist, preventing him from taking another step. Turning isn’t needed, he already knows who it is. The fingers feel cold against his feverish skin, but soft, in contrast to his own calloused hands.

“I’m sorry,” Whizzer’s voice is as soft as his hands. “I didn’t—“

Marvin turns. He looks at those bright brown eyes and smiles. The gesture is foreign in his lips. “Mendel’s office is just a 10-minute walk from here. Shall we?”

Whizzer looks at him like he’s grown three heads. But Marvin turns away and continues walking, gently pulling at the hand that’s still around his wrist to follow him.

They walk in complete silence, the sound muted around them while the chatter of New York City surrounds them. It feels like walking inside a bubble, yet somehow it doesn’t bother Marvin. With Whizzer’s hand stubbornly holding onto him, though his palm is starting to sweat, Marvin is hit by the realization that he doesn’t fully hate it. In fact, he feels like they have their feet fixed to the center of the world. For a second the entire New York City is their own.

Passing an art space that Marvin frequents when Mendel is late to their appointments—a behavior which Marvin was always annoyed by, since it seems like Mendel’s always off doing trivial things like picking up groceries or walking his dog that Marvin never seen—the hand around his wrist loosens before pulling away completely. Marvin resists his urge to turn. He can still feel Whizzer behind him, so he just lets his feet take him through this familiar street.

“What did you say his name again?” Whizzer’s voice is close behind him, a little bit on his right.

“Mendel. Mendel Weisenbachfeld.”

Whizzer makes a sound at the back of his throat.

This time, Marvin glances at him. He looks restless, almost worried. “What’s wrong?” He asks, surprised to find himself soften at the sight of that face.

“Nothing. Where is his building?”

Marvin points at a tall, red-bricked building one shitty coffee shop away from them. He resumes walking, entering the building that he frequents to every two weeks.

A scented candle’s flame sways as he pushes the door to the building open. The painting of Balinese woman he always finds creepy stares down at them from where it’s hung. Marvin takes a sniff of the cinnamon roll aroma in the end before making his way, past the empty receptionist to the door at the other side of the entrance. He knocks. There’s a sound of shuffling inside before Mendel opens the door.

“Marvin, you _have_ to stop coming here without an appointment,” Mendel’s face grumbles from the quarter-opened door.

Marvin frowns at the guy in front of him. “You said you’re not even a psychiatrist. Why would I need an appointment?”

“Well, yes, I am not, but I still have business—“ Mendel’s face pales as he glances behind Marvin, where Whizzer is watching them. Then he slams the door closed so rough that Marvin takes a few steps away.

“What the fuck, _Mendel_?!” He screams at the closed door.

“Move,” Whizzer pulls him aside by his shoulder. Marvin stares as he makes a small knife appear in his hand. The hilt is a yellowing bone that he hopes is only snatched from animal skeleton. He presses it on his palm; blood quickly trickles down his finger before he draws a symbol on the door. He mutters something under his breath.

Shadows slowly swallows the door from where his blood is drawn, before slowly disappearing, leaving no door to separate them from Mendel. Marvin follows as Whizzer stalks inside, his steps full of fury. Another question raises to his brain.

His eyes scan the room: Mendel is nowhere to be found, and with him, the furniture as well—the couch he usually lays on disappear, the desk that’s always scattered with papers, even the shelves containing psychological books that he never pays attention to. All that’s left is a lone chair on the center of the room.

“That goddamn asshole,” Whizzer curses loudly. He kicks the chair until it falls behind with a loud noise.

“Do you two… know each other?” Marvin, still confusedly looking around him, asks, a mere step away from Whizzer.

“I know that name is familiar.” Whizzer turns sharply to Marvin, brows furrowing. He looks like a wild animal, full of hot anger. “Your—your _psychiatrist_. He’s a smuggler.”

“A smuggler…?”

“He is a Magi from another world. He smuggles demons to this side of the world.” Whizzer’s knife falls to the floor as he fusses his hair in frustration with his wounded hand. Blood is smeared to his cheek as he groans. “He is the one person whose existence in this world made me sever my contact with my family.”

The hint of vulnerability and honesty in those sentences made Marvin stop. He stares at the man in front of him. “What… happened?” he asks.

Whizzer catches himself. He glares at Marvin. “I think I can ask the same to you, Mr. Marvin. How the fuck did you know a smuggler witch like that bastard?”

“I told you my aunt brought me to him.”

“Why him? There are dozens of other Magi like him.”

“I don’t know, Whizzer,” Marvin sighs. “I’m lost as much as you are. I don’t know anything, okay?” He catches Whizzer’s arm, surprised when the other doesn’t pull away. “If you don’t know, I don’t know either.” His hands move to Whizzer’s wrist now. “I don’t want you hurt,” he gestures at the wound. “Is that how you do your magic? With blood?”

“It’ll heal,” Whizzer pulls his hand away.

“No, it won’t.” Marvin’s eyes darted to the lines of scars in Whizzer’s body.

“You don’t know anything,” Whizzer replies, his voice faint suddenly. “You don’t know…”

Marvin grabs his wounded hand and kisses him—

He opens his eyes to find himself in Charlotte’s bar.

Marvin looks around: the bar is empty, even closed. A weak morning light peeks from the curtained windows, illuminating the floor, beating the dim neon words in the back of the bar; the seats around the room is pushed beneath the tables. He takes a step to the front, only to find himself barefoot.

Marvin looks down at his hand. He looks sickly pale, and he’s wearing a ratty maroon hoodie that he doesn’t recognize, alongside a brown trouser that he’s pretty sure he’s thrown away a few years ago during college. What the hell…? He’s pretty sure he was at Mendel’s office and kissing—

“Whizzer. Whizzer, stay awake.”

The voice travels through the empty bar. He follows it with slow, steady steps, feeling the cold tiles beneath his feet. The green light fills his eyes as he walks in, finding Whizzer hunched over on the couch, Charlotte kneeling beside him, blood that’s pooled on the floor staining her jeans.

_No_.

_He can’t die_.

_No. No. No. No._

Panicked thoughts drown his brain; he approaches the two figures to find Charlotte holding an opened wound on Whizzer’s wrist. Whizzer’s unconscious, head drooping on Charlotte’s shoulder.

_He can’t. He can’t die, Marvin_.

“Whizzer—!“ he tries to reach the two figure only to have his hand goes past them like they’re water. Panic chokes him.

_I can’t lose him anymore._

_No._

_Not this time_.

He puts his hand on Whizzer’s wrist and feels life dripping from his palm.

The world sways under him.

The feel of teeth on his lower lip makes him close his eyes. When he opens his eyes again, Whizzer is in front of him, kissing him back, and he can feel Whizzer’s warm cheeks as he cups it.

Suddenly, he pulls away. He looks around him. They’re in Mendel’s office again. Except this time, the lone chair on the room has rotten away, green mold growing in the wood.

Whizzer opens his eyes and stares at him. “Marvin?”

But Marvin ignores him. He reaches for Whizzer’s wrist. There’s a scar there, a big ugly bump that makes his ear ring in alarm. His eyes glance at the wound on his palm. Except it isn’t bleeding anymore. It’s healed, leaving only a scar.

Whizzer’s eyes follow his gaze and then back to Marvin. “Did you…?” He looks around him as if only realizing now that the chair has been destroyed.

“I… don’t know.” Marvin stutters. “I… don’t.”

He feels Whizzer’s hand on his cheeks. “It’s okay. Everything will be alright, okay? It’s okay.”

 

 

 

 

They go back to Charlotte’s bar. It is more of an unspoken agreement, as Marvin refuses to speak and only holds Whizzer’s hand tightly as the other pulled him to the streets and hails a cab to their destination.

The sunrise hit their skin as they step away from the cab. Whizzer fumbles with the chain of keys that he possesses before opening the key to the bar.

It’s empty. Marvin shivers with the sick familiarity of the situation. “Wait here,” Whizzer mutters at him, pushing him to sit on one of the bar stools. He complies, watching as Whizzer’s back disappear to the back room.

He comes back with a tired looking Charlotte. She seems disheveled, the dark circles under her eyes deepening. She rubs it as she stares at Marvin for a moment before sighing heavily as she pulls one of the seat that’s pushed into the table and sits. Meanwhile, Whizzer settles beside Marvin.

“He healed me,” Whizzer starts.

“Healed what? Your flu? Is he a Healer?” Charlotte asks as she yawns.

“No. The blood magic wound… he healed it,” Whizzer replies, gesturing at Marvin.

Charlotte’s previously divided attention focuses at once as she hears that. “Are you sure it was him?”

“Not exactly. The chair that was on the room rot after he healed me, and considering that it’s impossible to heal even by the most skillful healer, it’s doubtful that he did it on his own. Which means it’s his demon involved.”

For the first time in the last hour, Marvin speaks: “Can somebody catch me up what’s going on here?” His throat feels dry.

Charlotte leans back to the table and regards Marvin with a curious look. “Blood magic wound is unhealable by magic. It heals slowly. It needs a couple of days for it to close by itself,” she glances at Whizzer, frowning this time. “And when you’re a blood magic user who is reckless, sometimes that… leads into a couple of accidents. Like three weeks ago, when he was fighting a smuggler and ended up with an open artery.”

“It was a mistake,” Whizzer adds.

Charlotte raises an eyebrow as if to say, _is it really?_

“Three weeks ago, this also happened. I got… mysteriously healed for no reason.” Whizzer stares at Marvin, holding his hand. “Was this you as well?”

Three weeks ago. Which means it was the day of Kevin’s death. He knows this is what Whizzer is implying here. He killed Kevin to save Whizzer. He knows Whizzer can connect that dot by himself.

“I don’t know,” Marvin repeats the lie. He avoids Whizzer’s gaze.

“Why did you do it?”

“I just don’t want you to get hurt,” he answers honestly.

“ _Why_?” Whizzer’s frustration comes back. “You don’t know me.”

Marvin stares at the beautiful man in front of him. Whizzer is right, beside one thing. He does know him. He knows him for a long time. Or at least the demon inside him does.

“Why bring me here if you already know the answer?” he shoots back, and suddenly he realizes what’s happening. “You already made up your mind that I did it.”

He feels a rope encircling his wrist, and he hears Whizzer’s soft “I’m sorry,” before the world turns black.

 

 

 

 

It’s dark everywhere.

He can’t see anything but he knows from the feel of cold tiles around him that he’s on the floor. He blinks, though it doesn’t change anything that he can see. He sighs. He feels annoyed. No, that’s not right; what he feels is the hot, white fury in his chest, and this time it doesn’t choke him. This time it only makes him angry.

“Of course you’re angry, best friend,” he mutters to himself. “You saved him and this is how he pays you?”

His hand is tied on his back. He struggles to sit up for a few seconds before succeeding. It’s still dark around him—but there’s a piece of light that’s slowly approaching.

Marvin squints at it. It takes him a good moment before he realizes it’s a person, wearing a red hoodie, his hair disheveled, the brown trouser… A condescending smile on his face.

“Want to get out of here?” the figure in front of him asks as he sits down in front of Marvin. When he speaks, Marvin can feel the same voice trailing from his own lips. Yet it doesn’t seem weird; it feels like something that has happened before. The figure smiles and leans in. “Okay. Close your eyes. I’ll help you, best friend.”

 

 

 

 

Light floods his eyes, swallowing the darkness whole.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ah, yes, another kiss. it seems like someone's angry, tho ;D
> 
> i decided that this will be updated at the same time next saturday. things are... gonna get ugly, fast.

**Author's Note:**

> It's been a whole fuckin while since I've written a fanfic, but I needed to write my own twist to them. Expect me to appear a lot in this tag, haha. 
> 
> You can contact me on twitter over @ meriells or my tumblr at @willemsragnarsson to scream at me for screwing up their characterization.


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